Tag Archives: Gun Owners of America

“There is a sense that society is collapsing — the culture is collapsing. We’re collapsing in crime. The world is collapsing. Crazy people with bad haircuts have nukes. Everything is going bad — terrorism, etc. They want to be fully armed on their hill, at home… They’re Americans, and they want to go down fighting.”

Graphic from Americans for Responsible SolutionsThe good news is cars and driving are getting safer, thanks to better construction, a trend away from younger drivers, and maybe even because of harsher penalties for things like texting while driving or not wearing a seatbelt.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) is gunning for the NRA, which recently urged West Virginians to pressure their elected official to get in line. Manchin, who supports extending background checks to buyers at gun shows and online, was previously supported by the NRA because of his voting record on their issues. Now he is on their public enemy list.

Manchin: ‘What other purpose do we have here? Why do we ask to be policy makers when we’re afraid to engage?’

On the Morning Joe show, Manchin debuted his own new ad, and explained he didn’t go to Washington to serve the NRA.

“What other purpose do we have here?” Manchin asked. “Why do we ask to be policy makers and be involved in the public process when we’re afraid to engage? I’m not. I’m not afraid to engage. The worst they can do is defeat me and send me home to my family and the state I love, West Virginia. That’s a pretty good consolation. What are we afraid of?”

Manchin added that the strategy of the NRA and Gun Owners of America is to use lies and innuendo to work up the gullible and keep those donations flowing in.

“The only thing they use against me is: ‘we just don’t trust government,” Manchin said. “Well, I’m sorry if you don’t like it. Get involved and make it better. Don’t just sit and curse the wind. But they don’t want to get involved, they just want to keep this paranoia going on.”

There’s an interesting list of numbers on the website, Meet the NRA. Ladd Everitt, communications director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, recently called the National Rifle Association a “paper tiger.” With this record, I can see why.

The National Rifle Association of America Political Victory Fund received a 0.83% return on the $11 million they spent during the 2012 election cycle, the worst performance of any Super PAC that spent over $5 million in the election.

NRA PACs spent more than $13 million to defeat Pres. Obama alone, all for naught.

The NRA spent $100,000 in eight Senate races, and lost seven of them.

Of the 30 House incumbents who lost, 17 were endorsed by the NRA.

Maybe the NRA’s political fortunes are in part behind the rise of the even more radical Gun Owners of America (GOA). GOA refused to endorse Sen. John McCain in 2008 because they thought his record on “gun rights” (yes, apparently guns have rights) was weak. They endorsed Rep. Ron Paul in 2012 because they admired his inability to compromise.

And although Everitt continued to reference the more widely recognized NRA when he appeared recently on the Diane Rehm Show and described the unhinged nature of the new Burt Gummers of the world, he was probably also thinking of the GOA:

We often tell people this not your grandfather’s NRA. And, you know, the modern pro-gun movement today is marked by what we would call insurrectionist ideology, which is this belief that the NRA and others have put forward that there is an individual right under the second amendment to essentially shoot and kill government officials when you personally disagree with democratically enacted laws.

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Enumerati

15.6%

An early straw poll of members of the progressive group MoveOn.org shows a wide-open competition for liberal voters in the forthcoming 2020 Democratic presidential contest, NBC News reports. The most popular potential candidate was Beto O’Rourke at 15.6%, followed by joe Biden at 14.9%, and then Sen. Bernie Sanders with 13.1%.

Enumerati

29%

A new CNN poll finds President Trump’s approval rating for handling the Russia investigation dips to 29%, matching a low previously hit in June of this year. “But Robert Mueller’s approval rating is also down in the poll: 43% approve and 40% disapprove. That compares to a 48% approve to 36% disapprove split in early October. The dip in Mueller’s numbers comes almost entirely among independents, among whom approval has fallen 10 points to 36%.”

Enumerati

57%

A new NPR/PBS/Marist poll finds that 57% of Americans think President Trump should compromise on his border wall to prevent a government shutdown. Furthermore, nearly 69% of Americans do not consider building a border wall between the United States and Mexico to be an immediate priority for the next Congress.

Enumerati

$25,000

“Jessica Denson, a former staffer for President Donald Trump’s campaign, is fighting an order to pay nearly $25,000 for violating a nondisclosure agreement, according to court papers,” BuzzFeed News reports. “The award to the Trump campaign came out of arbitration — non-public proceedings the campaign pursued against Denson after she filed two lawsuits against it. Denson was ordered to pay $25,000 to the campaign in October, but the award wasn’t made public until Denson’s lawyers included it in court filings in New York County Supreme Court in late November.”

Enumerati

20

The Washington Post has instituted a new fact checking category — called “Bottomless Pinocchios” — for President Trump’s false claims that have been repeated at least 20 times and were originally rated Three or Four Pinocchios. “The Fact Checker has not identified statements from any other current elected official who meets the standard other than Trump. In fact, 14 statements made by the president immediately qualify for the list.”

Poetic Justice

Steve Bannon’s no longer calling important shots,
And his invitations to speak usually end in boycotts.
His latest speaking brouhaha
Came from the University of Montana,
Which canceled Bannon’s keynote at a conference on sex robots.

Verbatim

“Jesus loves Michael Cohen, but everybody else thinks he’s an idiot. He’s obviously a sleaze-oid grifter. And if I were a prosecutor, I wouldn’t base a prosecution on evidence given to me by Mr. Cohen.”

Verbatim

“Fake News has it purposely wrong. Many, over ten, are vying for and wanting the White House Chief of Staff position. Why wouldn’t someone want one of the truly great and meaningful jobs in Washington. Please report news correctly. Thank you!”

— President Trump, insisting on Tuesday that “he’s having no trouble finding a new chief of staff, despite having already burned through two such top aides and being turned down by his reported first choice,” Politico reports.

“We’ve had limited success in dealing with this President. His word isn’t good. Within 48 hours he reverses himself. It’s very difficult to enter into a long-term agreement.”

Verbatim

“These power grabs highlight one of the most disturbing facts about American politics today: The Republican Party has become institutionally indifferent to the health of democracy. It prioritizes power over principle to such an extreme degree that it undermines the most basic functioning of democracy. … In the long run, the GOP’s turn against democracy could well be a greater threat to the American experiment than anything President Trump has done.”